December 30, 2012 7:59 pm

Who says I'm too short?

QB RUSSELL WILSON

(On his touchdown run… ) We made a good call, but the defense did a great job of covering the play. We thought we were going to have a wide open touchdown pass, because they were so ramped up, the defense, for the run. But they did a great job of covering it up. I just extended the play. The offensive line did a great job of giving me enough time to make a play. I was trying to throw it to Zach to break the record and I realized that’s not me. I wasn’t worried about that. The whole thing was to win the game.

(On the importance of the win…) I think it was huge; I think we really needed that game. Obviously, we’ve been winning by a lot, in terms of points and everything, to go into the playoffs with a game like that, where it comes down to the fourth quarter, the last drive of the game, and to finish the way we did, that’s great. I think that was huge. I wouldn’t call it a wake up call, I think we were definitely ready to play, I just think that that was great for us going into the playoffs. The whole first half, we started off a little bit slow, especially offensively, I think we did things that were uncharacteristic of us, in terms of some of the penalties and everything. You have to credit the Rams defense. They’ve been doing a great job all season, really, when you watch the film of what they do and how they do it, in terms of their defensive line, and how active they are, and how many plays they make, they’re a great defense.

(On his feelings on going into the playoffs…) I’m so excited, I’m ecstatic. It’s a great opportunity. We’ve got 11 wins so far in the regular season, and now the whole season starts over. The mindset doesn’t change, though. Go 1 and 0 every week. Continue to compete throughout the week. Like I always say, the separation is in the preparation. We’re really excited about the opportunity, no matter where we go. 100 yards is 100 yards, and we’ll be ready to play.

(On tying the rookie TD pass record…) It’s such a blessing, because the guy is so great. To tie that record is really something special. It’s a tribute to my faith in God and all the things he’s put me through, and also my football team, and what they’ve done. The football team has really sparked throughout the whole entire season, the coaching staff has done a really great job of preparing me and it’s a whole team effort, and we did a great job this season.

(On going on the road for the playoffs…) To go 8 and 0 at home, that’s unbelievable It’s a tribute to our fans, and the 12th Man, and what they do for us, and now it’s a great opportunity for us to go on the road, and play either the Redskins or the Cowboys, and we’ll be excited. 100 yards is 100 yards, and we’ll be ready to play.

(On the offensive troubles in the first half…) The biggest thing is that we were kind of getting off schedule there. We got in some long situations, third down and long, second and long, with some of the penalties that we were having. The biggest thing is that we continued to fight, continued to play, and in the second half, we played great. We did great with our opportunities and we made some big time plays. Our offensive line did a tremendous job of stepping up and protecting me, and guys made some plays down the field, and the running game really clicked, and the coaching staff did a great job of putting us in a great situation to win the game.

(On the long pass to Golden Tate….) The Rams did a great job of pressuring on that play, and I was trying to get enough time to extend the play. I had to get out of the pocket a little bit. Golden Tate did a great job of extending the play and giving me a chance to throw it down field. He came up with a big time catch, that was a huge, huge first down for us.

(On the fumble recovery by Golden Tate…) That was unbelievable, too. For Golden to get there and fight for the ball the way he did, and pick up that fumble, that was huge for our football team. That allowed us to continue the drive, and continue our opportunity to win the game.

(On taking more hits than usual…) I really don’t think I got hit that much. I just continue the play. You don’t worry about it. You know you’re going to get hit in football games. My offensive line, they’ve done an unbelievable job all season. We knew that their defensive line was one of the best ones we were going to face for sure. They’re extremely talented. They do a lot of great things up front. We did a good job of stopping them in the second half, and that was huge for us. It allowed us to continue drives and give us a chance to win the football game.

(On talking to Chris Long after the game…) I talked to Chris Long for a while. He’s a great human being, and I know his family extremely well, the Long family. The way he plays, he has a high motor, and he’s a tremendous football player.

(On his scrambling…) I feel like some of those times, I had to try to get a couple of extra yards. I tried to be smart, but I have to take a couple of hits. I think the biggest thing was trying to win the game for our football team, and we did that tonight.

FB MICHAEL ROBINSON

(On winning a close game like this and if it is a good thing for the team heading into the playoffs…) “Yeah it’s the type of game we needed. You say that, but then you hate to be in a close game, but it is definitely a game that we needed. We needed to feel the pressure, we needed to feel like we had to come back and just keep persevering. This game shows the type of character we have in this locker room.”

(On if it felt like the focus was a little off with all the talk being about everything, but the Rams…) “I just think naturally when you start winning and blowing teams out, you guys can be a distraction a little bit. It is what it is. It’s very hard not to look at the television, it’s very hard not to look at Sportscenter and stuff like that, but I’m glad we were able to handle it and persevere and come out with a win. That’s a good football team we just played, and they’re going to be good, they’re going to be a force to be reckon with next year.”

(On if he is going to watch the Sunday night game tonight and if he has any preference…) “Yeah I’m probably going to watch it and pick up some signals or something. It doesn’t really matter who we play. Both teams are really good teams, and they both will be a good test. We know we’re going to have to travel so we’re just sitting back seeing who we’re going to play and try to go play Seahawk football on the road.”

(On when adversity struck and this game and they lost the lead did the team get down and figure it wasn’t their day…) “That’s probably how you felt as far as it not being our day, but we always stay true and we kind of figured that something was going to happen where we were going to be able to pull it out. We just needed the ball, needed to cut down on the mistakes and the penalties. We had explosive plays, but we were just getting in our own way. I’m just glad we were able to overcome that because we’re going to need that in the playoffs.”

FS EARL THOMAS

(On going to the playoffs…) “We’re just in position where we set out to be at the beginning of the season. It’s a new season now and we’re just going to take it one game at a time and see what happens.”

(On Russell Wilson play…) “He has been playing well for us. Second half the season he has been playing lights out and we believe in him and the way he prepares. Like I always say, it definitely shows up on Sunday. “

DE CHRIS CLEMONS

(On fumble/sack play…) ”Referee is going to call the game the way they see it, so I wasn’t too jacked up about it I knew that play could be reversed along with the penalty that was on the field. I knew they would revisit that play so I wasn’t 100% about it. I was just hoping the call was going to go our way.”

(On comparing seasons…) “You always want to have your spot solidified, you never want to go into the last game and decide where your playoff spot is. We knew coming into this game it was going to be a dog fight and we knew the only place we could go in the playoffs was up and that was our motivation was to come out and just compete like we always know how to, and we never thought about who we were playing or what we were playing for. We just knew we were playing for each other.”

(On Bradford not being sacked…) “They blocked pretty well today they had a few chip blocks to try and slow us down on the outsides and we have to figure out a way to see the chip blocks.”

(On being double teamed…) “ Yeah, I mean that was the plan coming into this game. I knew they would bring the chip block either to my side or Bruce’s side. It was something we had already game planned for but like I said they played pretty well up front today.”

LB BOBBY WAGNER

(On Rams playing for something…) “No, we knew they were going to come in and try and beat us to end their season on a high note and we were ready for it.”

(On going 8-0 at home..) “Feels great, just to show them that we love the support they give us and we’re going to protect the house.”

(On beating a division opponent…) “Yeah definitely, you never get an opportunity to beat the guys that beat you earlier in the season so doing that is a great feeling.”

TE ZACH MILLER

(On being undefeated at home…) “Feels great, that was another reason why we wanted to win today and a huge reason, we wanted to finish the year out right at home. It shows how much of a home field advantage we have here with the crowd, you saw the false starts today from the Rams so were excited about our crowd and they really give us energy.”

(On watching scoreboard during game…) “I never saw San Francisco’s score until I got into the locker room after the game, so no scoreboard watching for us.”

WR GOLDEN TATE

(On the fumble recovery…) “I had my hands and arms around it the whole time but with those big dudes down there and linemen pulling it away from me it was tough. I didn’t know if it was their guys pulling or our guys but I knew that I had the ball in my hands and I was just trying to hold on until the referees saw that I had possession. I didn’t want anyone to take it from me.”

(On getting open for Russell…) “That’s one thing that we know, with any given moment our quarterback can break a tackle and he can also run around, it’s fun to run. He broke that tackle and guys thought he was about to run so I turned up field and he made a perfect throw where no one could get it but me, I caught it and just made a play and thankful for the opportunity to help this team win.”

(On when to break out of route…) “It’s something we practice, we have specific rules we’re supposed to do but being 16 games into the season you kind of get a feel for what your quarterback is going to do. At first I was trying to see if he was going to commit to running but once I found he was looking for me I just turned up field, heck of a throw and a catch.”

DE RED BRYANT

(On playing the close games…) “We knew going into this game we have a lot of respect for the Rams, Coach Fisher is doing a great job and if I’m not mistaken, it was 13-12 when we played in St. Louis. We knew what type of game this was going to be. These are the types of games we have to win in the playoffs; very seldom do you get on a streak like we were on with scoring over 40-plus points a game. But if you’re not on top of what you are supposed to be doing then we have to just slug it out to the end and we can play that style of football as well.”

(On play at home…) “It means a lot, we are all extremely fortunate to being playing for this team, this type of franchise, and the fans. It’s no question we have the best fans in the business and in the National Football League. We get the opportunity to come out here and live out our dreams in front of 60 (thousand)-plus fans and every opportunity we get at home we feed off those guys. I believe coach said we are the only team this year to be undefeated at home and that in itself tells the progress the team has made since I’ve been here.”

CB RICHARD SHERMAN

(On his interception…) “I was hunting. I was waiting on the opportunity all day. I’ve been patient, I’ve been playing tight coverage and didn’t get many opportunities, so when I got an opportunity to overlap, I overlapped and got my hands on it.”

(On was it better to play a close game right before the playoffs…) “Definitely, Definitely. I think we needed this test heading into the playoffs to help us know how it’s going to feel in the playoffs, to know it’s going to be a grind every week, it’s going to be tough opponents every week, and it’s only going to get tougher.”

(On if it matters who he plays…) “Not at all.”

(On if he was trying to keep an eye on the San Francisco game…) “A little bit, but they didn’t show the score so after that we were locked in. They weren’t showing the score so it didn’t really matter. We got the win; we did everything we could do, so the rest is history after that.”

(On what does 8-0 at home mean to the team…) “It means that we have some amazing fans, and that we play well in front of them. They do an amazing job every week. They show up, even for a game like this that really doesn’t matter to them. They had a prime time game last week, and they could have not shown up today. A lot of people could’ve stayed home because essentially this game doesn’t mean as much to the fans, we’re in the playoffs regardless, but they showed up and they showed up loud as always. They were enthusiastic to say the least.”

C MAX UNGER

(On the adjustments made at halftime after giving up five sacks in the first half…) “That was all on us. That was a poor job on the offensive line. All of us getting the communication right, talking to Russell Wilson, figuring out what we needed to do to get it fixed, and we did some adjustments and came out in the second half a little bit more clean, but we just can’t have that. It’s unacceptable.”

(On what was St. Louis doing that gave them problems…) “They bring a lot of pressure and they move their defense a lot. They play a lot of different defenses, a lot of different coverages, and it’s just us recognizing it, whether or not we need to make an adjustment on the line of scrimmage, checking a play or even if we’re going to be hot we just all have to know what we’re doing.”

(On what Coach Tom Cable said during halftime…) “He was pretty mad about the half. We totally got beat that first half there is no question about that. He just put it on us to fix it, and we knew exactly what we had to do and it was just about calming down and executing and keeping our quarterback clean.”

(On if it was a good thing that they got pushed right before the playoffs…) “St. Louis is a good team, and they have been doing the same stuff all year. We knew that they were going to do it, and we failed to be adequately prepared for it. It’s just a step in this team growing. It was a definitely a tough game. So going into the playoffs we’ll see who we’re playing and what we need to do offensively, particularly in the offensive line to keep the quarterback clean.”

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About

Gregg Bell joined The News Tribune in July 2014. Bell had been the director of writing for the University of Washington's athletic department for four years. He was the senior national sports writer in Seattle for The Associated Press from 2005-10, covering the Seahawks in their first Super Bowl season and beyond. He's also been The Sacramento Bee's beat writer on the Oakland Athletics and Raiders. The native of Steubenville, Ohio, is a 1993 graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., and a 2000 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism.

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I’m glad to read those comments from Max Unger. He’s taking responsibility, and he sounds like a leader. The O line played their worst game since Miami, but I think they will be serious and ready next week.

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